PEARSE SQUARE, DUBLIN,
1970 or 2002 ?
Boarding houses here were used for many years by Actors
and Musicians visiting the City

By Lucy Felix

On the bus to Ringsend
Next stop, 'Theatrical Square !!'.
Coming up on the left.
What costume is it wearing these days ?
'Its shrunk'.

An ill fitting garment, resplendent in all its ugly
symmetry, bushes like pom poms, buttons for a clown. with
his thin ankles and wrists exposed to all the passing
traffic.

'Where could rites of passage take place here? The first
time you could climb up onto the roof of the shelter and
survey the square from a height, a startling sight coming
as I did from the basement level. Getting out of sight
was vital too, surrounded on all sides by the watchful
eyes of the houses, a circuit of disappearing acts could
be pulled from a hat, crouching behind the front park
wall, along the narrow passage between the railings and
the towering cliff of the ball alleys, into the deep dark
alleys, one facing to the front, another guarding the
back, making a dash to the generous

(Ondine Braddell 1972.)

embrace of the shelter's walls. For a
quick get away, we slid through the one gap in the
railings, by some freak of nature wider than all the
others. 'All strangers can enter by the gates'. The big
ones vaulted over the spikes with long legged ease. The
witches hat, a roundabout, a conical construction of wood
and iron was our gathering point, legs dangling, clanging
and shaking we would start to twist, faster and faster,
faces blurring until the pusher leaps on grinding us to a
bone shaking halt. I got up early the morning it snowed,
crossing the vast unexplored territory of the football
pitches, unexplored since yesterday. Making perfect
footprints in the snow, running across the unbroken soft
blanket until there was a network of connecting paths.
Then gangs of brothers got up, and threw buckets of water
to make a skating rink, but only succeeded in making a
slush. In the snow the clear geometry of our square stood
out with dark lines of swing frames, railings and tree
branches sprawling across the sky,

'Lets go to Misery Hill', a place that
lived up to its name, docklands still and empty, faceless
warehouse walls. The headless horseman. We turned and ran
a hurtling mass of screaming bodies till we were safe
again, home again able to enjoy the exhilaration of our
fear.

'Did you see him?' 'No I was in the middle but I heard
him'

Today the estate agent sweeps his hand across the
miniature lawns devoid of children, like a music hall
artist.

'At ENORMOUS expense I present a Victorian square'.

The only clue to its past is the way my body leads me to
our gap, a body that now cannot slide again between these
railings.

MA!

What will I say
Don't say a word,
Your mouth is too quick
And your head is wood.
Pick up your clothes,
Don't spill the milk,
Take your finger out of the socket
Or you'll never see silk.
He's on his eighth pint
And be coming in soon;
Look at the place,
It's all in a ruin.
There will be torture in hell
This very same eve.
Would you look at your man
Wiping his nose in his sleeve.